The Stem Cell Transplant Is Scheduled, Now What?

The Stem Cell Transplant Is Scheduled, Now What?  Or better yet, what all needs to be done? 

Before, Denis and I got home from the transplant doctor, the dates were booked but there were still so many unanswered questions.  

• Where will we going to stay?
• Would the insurance cover everything?
• Who would take care of our home, dogs and my mom?  

In this episode, I want to share the preparation experience.  Some things went smoothly, others were learning experiences and also the things we didn’t think about and forgot. 

The doctors and the transplant team do a great job providing resources for your loved one, but as a caregiver, there was much more to plan and prepare.   That’s why I’m sharing a series of episodes about my loved one's bone marrow transplant (aka stem cell transplant) so that you, the caregiver can find helpful tips and hints to make your journey a bit easier.

Get the full episode notes at https://www.cathylvan.com/episode152

Transcript

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The transplant is now scheduled. Whether you call it a stem cell transplant or a bone marrow transplant, in my words, they're the same thing. But the transplant is scheduled. And now what? Or better yet, what all needs to be done from a caregiver perspective? Well, before Dennis and I got home from the transplant doctor, the dates were booked, but there were still so many unanswered questions. What were where were we going to stay? Would the insurance cover it all? Or what was going to be our out of pocket? Who would take care of our home, the snow removal, all of the maintenance, taking care of our two fur babies, our Labrador retrievers? And then I had the whole side of caregiving for my mom. Those are just to name a few. And boy, do I have another great episode when it comes to the stem cell transplant, bone marrow transplant process. But before we get started, I always like to start out with something personal if I have it going on. And all I can say is living in the northern part of Wisconsin, this month has been very snowful. I know that's not a word, but there has been so much snow. Oh my gosh. I don't remember, probably in the last five years, getting this much snow. And it's funny because we'll get a lot of snow like we did last night. I think they said yesterday we had four inches, and then last night we got over eight inches of snow, which is a foot. But then it all melts, and then we get another bits of snow. Last week I was so frustrated with the snow and wanting spring because I'm seeing robins flying outside. I'm seeing buds on the trees, and then the little patches of green grass as the snow melts, which now it probably won't, I probably won't see grass for a while. But last week I was pruning trees and bushes in my snow boots and my winter coat and my my stocking cap because you know what? I'm just gonna go outside and tell Mother Nature I'm tired of her precipitation. Well, I think I better not go outside now in my snow boots because it's going to go over the top of my boots. But that's kind of one thing with the weather. And another thing, I am reading this book. I'm gonna lean over and grab it here once. I'm reading the book that what I do each and every day is I try to read 10 pages of some sort of self-improvement nonfiction book. And I always try to look for growth and development from my end. And I'm reading this book, and I know it's probably been out for a couple of years now, but it is so good, and I highly recommend The Accidental Caregiver. It's by Kimberly Fraser, and the little tagline on the cover of the book is Wisdom and Guidance for the Unexpected Challenges of Family Caregiving. You're going to hear me talking about some things in future podcast episodes, and I have so many things that I can re reference. The first or the one of the chapters is on uh resilience, which I love in the language, one chapter is on challenge, loss, and grief, and one chapter's on new normal. Well, I better stop because I could do a whole podcast episode on her book. So, but let me jump into today's episode. But those are just a couple of personal things that um I wanted to share with you. Last week, now we talked about in episode 151. We talked about the preparation for the stem cell transplant, or for Dennis, it was they had to they used his bone marrow, um, and that's the cells that they transplanted. And we I talked about the consultation with the doctor and preparing for the consultation with the doctor. And where what are the things that you can do to prepare? Well, this week we're gonna talk about the actual date now is being scheduled, and you are now in this packing mode, this paperwork mode, and getting things prepared because you're going to be leaving your home for six weeks, eight weeks, ten weeks, whatever the transition time is for the procedure. So I want to share the preparation experiences that I had. Some things went really smooth or smoothly, others were a learning experiences. And also there were things that I didn't think about, didn't ask questions about, or I forgot to go ahead and even consider. And my hope in this whole episode and these episode series that I'm doing regarding this whole transplant process is that it will spark thoughts and ideas for you. Now, like I said in the last episode, if this is not something your loved one is going through, yeah, it's there's going to be a lot of references to that. But I still think you can find bits and pieces that are going to help you in whatever process you're going through, because there's going to be little nuggets of information that you can glean from. But if you are truly involved in this or this is come something upcoming, save this episode, download this episode, or if you know somebody that's going through this, send them this as an extra gift because I do this free. I don't get any funding for my podcast episodes at all. And my own passion is that I want to share my knowledge, my experiences, my discoveries with you. So it'll be a lot easier for you or that caregiver that it's going to. So let me start out with the most overwhelming piece in this phase where you now have the stem cell transplant scheduled, and you're thinking, okay, what do I have to do next? The most overwhelming piece for me was all of the forms and the paperwork and the approvals and the consent forms, all of that kind of stuff is exhausting because you have to go ahead and go through the process. The transplant coordinator took care of most of it for us, but it felt very, very confusing. So once the doctor approves your loved ones and they qualify to start the process, you begin the consent process. And that more or less is your loved one has to consent to the procedure. Uh, the insurance company has to do the consents and the approvals. And the consents to do the to do it and make the consent means that, yeah, Dennis can go ahead with the process, but he has to pass all of the labs and the tests and the pre-surgeries and the chemotherapy to be healthy for that as well. And so I grabbed here the um notes that we had when Dennis had to go ahead and go through the process, but more or less, he had tests like pulmonary tests, he had to have an EKG and an echocardiogram. Uh, he had to he had to have blood work done. Um, he had to be tested weekly for COVID. And then this, I didn't know what the name of this this um port surgery was. He had a port put in for his normal chemotherapy, which more or less looks like an IV little extension where they could put the needle in that comes out of his chest, so they don't have to poke his vein every time. But they removed that because they had to put in what was called a trifusion catheter line placement and an indwelling port remove, and then they had to remove the port. For me, in my opinion, and for my thing, it looked like you're hooking up a DVD player with multiple prongs on him. That's what it looked like coming out of his chest. He said it wasn't painful, but it looked very painful because in order for them to do all the work, he had to have more than a couple places to insert. And so he also had to go through a round of chemotherapy to just ensure that there were they could, in my terms, kill as much cancer as they could. I know that's not the medical term, and then he had all of these injections that he had to take, like the this nupogen injection, which stimulates the bone marrow, and then um and then it he had mozzibul, I don't know, I'm not pronouncing it right, that stimulates the stem cells out of the marrow. So he had all of these things that he had to do, and he had to consent for all of those. And we had I really read about all of the drugs and the paperwork and all of the risk and stuff like that. Well, the second round of paperwork and the consents were the removal of his bone marrow. He was lucky enough to be able to have his keep his have use his own bone marrow. Some patients and loved ones are not lucky enough that they're not healthy enough, and so they have to find a donor, and the donor then would have to remove, they would have to remove the bone marrow. Um, and what they do then is they have to then pull it out in Kathy's terms, and then it goes through this little reharvesting, it shouldn't be little, this harvesting machine. And it really takes and and separates. I have a video on it separates what they need from what they don't need out of his bone marrow, and then what they need then it then is they take that and then they freeze that for a for a certain length of time before they re-inject that back into him and they call it reharvested. And so each time they do something like that, there's more paperwork to go through and and stuff. And so at the beginning, I was so confused at all of that. In addition to that paperwork and that piece that uh Dennis did most of the signing for, we had to go through the referral process to get into this nonprofit housing called Kathy's House. And it's totally not my name. Uh, Kathy's house is named after a person that um passed away from cancer, but she saw a need that they needed a nonprofit housing place that was safe and secure and close to the facility. Well, the referral process has to be done from the transplant doctor. And in order for us to qualify, we had to be uh outside of the 50 mile radius, and he had to have the excuse me, the diagnosis that he had. Now, hotels were another option for us, but it is so scary to be at a hotel from a health risk perspective, from a um, from a he had he has to be infection free and virus free and safety. And so, um, and there was an you had to have a place where you could cook and stay there for a prolonged length of time. And the cost was so huge for us. You're talking, you know, hundreds of dollars a week to stay at a place. And so the nonprofit Kathy's house uh required required a referral from the physician that took a few days, then once they received it, they would then contact us about the availability, about the rules, about the paperwork, about you know, everything that needs to be done there. And so I remember getting the email that we the doctor approved, and then Kathy's house then contacting us saying these are the rooms available based on our length of stay, and then all of the the rules, and um, for example, one of the rules was uh masks were required, you had to be COVID tested before you could, you had to have proof that you were you didn't have COVID, um, and you had to bring that proof in with you. And so what we did is we bought COVID tests. We took them 48 hours before, because that's what they had said, and then we took a picture of the results of the COVID testing. Um, and then Dennis was tested every week. And so um, so those were some of the rules, and there were definitely were more rules that you had to clean your own plate, your own room, you had to do your own laundry and all that kind of stuff, so and your sheets and stuff like that. And so that was all of the things it's huge to fill out and and do, including the health insurance was another one because the the physicians in the facility send in the pre-authorization, and then you don't know. You I you were left and like, okay, what happens? What is going on? And so I worked for a health insurance company, and so I just pretty much called and said, Okay, who is handling my husband Dennis's case? Do you have everything that you need? I wanted to know what was covered, what was not covered, what they needed, that sort of thing, so that we could speed up the process. The worst case scenario, and I had dreams about this. I didn't want to come home from his whole procedure and find out that we were owed, you know, a quarter of a million dollars for this procedure, that kind of thing. And so once we I walked through and made multiple calls and waited for callbacks, we were assigned a case manager and his name was Dave. We got his his number, um, and then we went through a series of questions. Here's a hint some things that you're gonna want to ask is the typical stuff like out of pocket is how much is are we the is a facility inpatient, outpatient? You should have probably asked those questions ahead of time, but it's always nice to re-ask them and what's the coverage and what all that kind of stuff. But also, I asked simple things like, Do you pay for housing? And from from our plan, they paid $50 a day. Well, when Kathy's house, they asked, could you afford to pay anything per day at Kathy's house for your stay? Otherwise, it was free. So I went ahead and said, yes, we could pay $50 a day because that's what the health insurance is going to cover. And so we cut them the checks so that that they would be paid that way. But that's nice to kind of know because if we stayed in a hotel $50 a day, we couldn't even get a place, or if we did, I wouldn't want to even be there. Um, they also paid for mileage, and that was really important for us too, up to a certain amount. So the mileage there and back that we we could we got reimbursed for. And then I asked questions like, he'll need prescriptions when he's at Freightert Hospital. Is that going to be covered underneath the plan, or do I have to go to an in-network uh place, um, a pharmacist, or and they they walked us through and we could we could get everything right at the facility and didn't have to leave. And I I just kept asking, what are the other services? So just kind of food for thought. Though that was really nice to have. We also had Dennis also had a cancer insurance, a supplemental cancer insurance. So I did some checking on that and found out what the per diem or per day was for hit for this type of thing. Um, and so you have, you know, you have the all of these tests and stuff to be done, and and all of this insurance and all of the paperwork to be done, and you're left there going, okay, so what do they need? Like medical records, physician signatures, faxing in in the paperwork. And so my food for thought is know who your contact is at the facility, and don't make the mistake that I made, where I just gave it to the nurse and said, Hey, can you give this to Jeannie for me? We need this sign for the disability insurance, or we need this sign for the cancer insurance, or I need this sign for my disability. Because what happens is the nurse is so busy you don't know when that person got it. And so, my question right away then was I actually emailed the transplant coordinator and said, who is the point of contact for all of the extra things that need to be signed or requests that we get? And I talked about all of those requests, and where can I drop things off, or where can I fax them to, or whatever it would be? And so I work through all of that, and then at that point, where can I pick it up when it's done? Because the worst thing that would happen is they would mail it back to my home address and I would be um away from home, and so yeah. So what we had my husband's paperwork that needed to be signed, and medical records and faxing required. I had the same for my disability insurance and so on. And so for me, that process was quite cumbersome. And I had this little notebook where I had on each page who I was working with and where I was in the process, so that each and every day I could do that follow-up that I would do with each piece and where is it and stuff like that. Don't get me wrong, there were many times I wanted to throw in the towel and be waiting on paperwork or the follow-up or the doctor's signatures, or um the doctor was out of the office for the rest of the week, you know, that kind of thing, I learned very fast that you had to be patient, but you also had to have the right contact people, like Dennis for his disability and stuff. I knew his uh his HR contact or human resources contact at his office. And so once the doctor said they signed it and they faxed it in, I could say, Hey Tracy, do you did you get it? And she would go ahead and you know let me know. And as a matter of fact, Dennis got her text, and so it was really nice to check in with her every day, and uh asking the transplant coordinator and being able to do that, having Dave as our our health insurance case manager, he was so easy to work with. And I asked right away, if we have further questions, is it better to email you or call you? And then he would he even went above and beyond, and he checked in with Dennis during the transplant uh progress and asked him how he was doing, and then he would say, Say hi to Kathy. I know we've worked a lot together, and then once we had the housing in place, then Kayla, our contact person at the housing place, I did the same thing. Kayla, is it better to call me or contact you with questions via email? And she liked email better, and we could go back and forth. And so at the big so I had all of I had a binder and then I had all of these people's names behind a tab. A binder, but I also put them in my contact list of my phone because I'm not going to always carry that binder around. So I had them in my phone so I could go ahead and do keep them in the loop and I could do my follow-ups anywhere and everywhere I was because not only in this preparation process, I wasn't at away from home yet, but I was working and I was caregiving for my mom and I was doing other things as well. Okay, next is arranging the housing and the Kathy's house that we stayed at, K-A-T-H-Y. She's different than my name, but um, like I said, the doctor had to start with the referral process. And after the referral process was okayed, then there was the amount of forms to fill out. Um, and even things like in the form, which I thought was really cute and nice, is are there any events that you're celebrating while you're there? So not only was it just forms that they needed to go ahead and keep with their records, but they also wanted to know a little bit about us. Um, but there was so many unknowns when you're filling out the paperwork. And so prior though to accepting, getting accepted, oh, I was out there online looking at their website and researching as much as I could. I love looking at pictures and reading reviews and their newsletters and all about their facilities. I could see their pictures of their rooms, I could see the kitchen area, I could see the sitting areas, I could see the washers and the dryers, and they had a little workout room and a big family room. So I could see those things online. So it made me feel a little bit better. And then I asked who knew about Kathy's house. So I sent a Facebook post out to um on my page and said, has anybody stayed at Kathy's house or know of anybody who stayed at that facility so that they could I could contact them and ask them. That's the best way. Word of mouth is finding out like little tidbits to say what what things did you pack? What things do you that you found out while you were there? And then I got more information after I accepted. So um, just the little things that matter to me at that time. They shared that they had a reef refrigerator in the room, but they also give you a refrigerator to use, like a shelf in the refrigerator to use for yours, and they give you a freezer shelf and stuff like that. So I could cook meals there, which was really important because Dennis couldn't eat once he was prone to all of the infections and he couldn't, he could not eat out like at a deli, or we couldn't eat out at a facility for the chance of him catching something. So it was important there. The the rooms looked really nice, like a like a four-star, five-star hotel room. They had a lazy boy, they had two twin beds, a TV, a desk, a bathroom, the the typical look. But they also what was really important to me, and then that was one of the questions, is they had a strong Wi-Fi and they had a copy machine and a fax machine free to use, which helped because I was still, when I got there, I was still doing paperwork. And so, like that. Um, one of the things that we got was that they require that we show, like I said earlier, show a negative COVID test 48 hours prior. So, which made me think I had we had to go order COVID little COVID things. And I brought more along just for myself. I knew Dennis was gonna get COVID tested, but I did myself anyway every week too, to just ensure that I was was free of the virus. Masks were required. They talked about it's a clean and a safe environment, how you had to clean your own rooms. Um, they supplied things for you. You had um they they safety was another concern, and they had parking lot, but it was um had a gated parking lot. So it was just nice to be able to see that. What things though drove me crazy because I didn't know were what I should pack. You know, you're not packing for a trip or a resort away from home it or even but you felt like you were packing for a camping trip in a way because you had to pack your food and your clothes and stuff like that. And so, do we need towels and blankets? I didn't know. So I emailed Kayla and asked her about that, and found out that they supplied the bedding and the kitchen, um, kitchen towels and uh bath towels and all that kind of stuff were provided. You had to go ahead and do your own laundry, or if you wanted to, they had a had a bin where you could go ahead and they had a service clean the uh bedding, but we liked doing our own because we could use um I'm trying to think of what it is, non-scented and and it was allergen-free for him. And so we like that, and we like to put the extra um set non-scented downy in there so it felt they didn't feel crisp and raw. Um, and I found out that he needed that. Um, but I didn't know things like do we bring our own laundry soap? Do we do we need toweling in the room? Because I was gonna bring my coffee pot, and so I needed toweling. Um, what about cleaning supplies, hand sanitizer, sanitizer wipes, cleans? What about all of those things? To to make a long story short, I packed all those things, but I realized that we didn't need them. They supplied them at their the facility, which is absolutely wonderful. So we just donated those things when we were there. But I packed enough food for a few days. It was just crazy because we packed coolers with us because we had to bring food down. Um, and I was kind of on the anxiety and stress side because Dennis couldn't go grocery shopping anymore because he had to stay away from crowds. And so I'm like, okay, I'm away from home. I don't know where to shop. And that was one of the suggestions I gave to Kathy's house is I wish there would be like maps or places that they would recommend. I just went out and started driving around, and I ended up at the third place. I grocery shopped at two different places, but I ended up finding a place that I felt more comfortable with, and I did my grocery shopping there. I wanted a place and no slam on Walmart or anything like that. I wanted a place that wasn't busy and had the high-quality food that was healthy for him and what we needed. And so um I found a place and I learned over time what time to shop so it wouldn't be crowded and I would be less amped to getting anything as well. Um, the things though that you want to consider too is what are you gonna pack for your own comfort? The things that you're gonna need for yourself. Sure, Kathy's house had a coffee pot, a community coffee pot, and they had water and they had juice and stuff like that. But this gal likes my coffee, and I like my specific organic coffee. And so I brought my coffee pot. I brought my coffee and I had it in my room because to have a cup of coffee, have to walk down and get another cup of coffee. I I just wanted my own coffee. And I even brought my, is it called a neutral bullet? I think that's what it's called. I brought my my mixer for my green shake and my ingredients so I could have my healthy green shake and I brought my own. They had one there, I learned after weeks that I was there. We had our we brought our snacks and healthy things that we needed. I own and I did as well. I also brought my computer. I brought my computer. I knew I wanted to podcast there, so I brought that along. And Dennis brought his iPad, he brought a crossword puzzle. Um, we actually brought a card table with us so he could have his crossword puzzles in the room. And he brought his like his um um what are those uh word search games and little books and stuff like that, and his stuff that he could read too, um, anything that would make him comfortable. And so, but we thought about our own comfort. Now, lessons learned. I wish I would have done more things, but I'll talk about that in a minute. But based on this research binder that Kath uh that Freightered Hospital or Jeannie or Transplant Coordinator gave us, they recommended that we bring some over-the-counter meds and things along with us. And I was so glad I recognized that as we were packing, like Emodian for the diarrhea, Tums for any heartburn or things that I think there was another Tums was another cure for something else, and I can't remember. Uh, Tylenol, preparation, AIDS, which seems really silly, but I mean, there are times that poor guy was in the bathroom for two or three days straight. Chapstick and throat lozenges and um uh just things like that. We ended up buying a medicine box or a pill box. It was on the list, but he had a smaller pill box, and he thought, oh, this will be fine. But the amount of medications that he needed, I ran all over Carnation. I don't know if that's the term that you're used to, but all over the city looking for one that had morning, noon, and night or morning noon dinner and bedtime, and nobody had any. And so I ended up, thank goodness, ordering it on Amazon and it came a couple days later. But yeah, that was something that I had to learn. Um, we also went and got a digital uh thermometer because uh one of the things that I had to do was check his temperature after overnight and stuff like that. So, so those are some of the things that we pack. Then there was the home front I had to prepare for. And I had to prepare that. Um, and what I mean by that was who is gonna take care of the house, the snow blowing. Daisy and Cooper, uh Daisy and Cooper are two Labrador puppies. My mom, because I was her primary caregiver. And asking family and friends to help for six to eight weeks minimum was hard for me. And I researched trying to see if there could be somebody that came into the house to take care of the dogs in the house, and it was just too much money for us. We just couldn't afford it. And to be honest with you, I didn't feel comfortable. And so after exploring many options, my mom said to me, which she I she was the angel at that time, she goes, I stay in my apartment every day. Why can't I just move into your home and be in your home? Sorry, if you hear my dog barking, you're that's real life here. Um, but and I thought, yeah. And then in the back of my mind, I could just go ahead and have people visiting every day to check on her, check on the dogs, do whatever needs to be done, but there's somebody staying in my home, which is really nice. And so after talking with her and talking to Dennis, we made the decision to go ahead and bring my mom into the home. And then, like I said, we had uh my brother helping with the primary caregiver stuff, taking her to appointments. And uh uh Julie, my friend, she was there. Um, she took um shifts and walking the dogs because I walk my dogs every day. Um, she took shifts bringing my mom some food in. My three sons did their part and snow blowing and coming in. And so my ring camera, which was like really great to be able to see, I could see every time somebody would come and visit. And I would snapshot it, and then I would thank them on like a Facebook story, and by the end of like two or three weeks, they would lean in and they would wave and talk with me on the camera, which was just great, and um it was good. One of the things that I did as well because I was so worried about my mom, and she doesn't need a lot of care from a from a care perspective, but I want to make sure that she was physically okay and mentally okay and emotionally okay. And I have two big dogs, and so I don't want them to knock her down, and so I FaceTimed her every single day. It helped her so much, but in the long run, it helped me as well because I could talk to somebody else. And being in the room 24-7 with my husband or in the clinic or hospital 24-7 with my husband, that got to be a lot. So I'll talk about that in future episodes too. So, so when it came to caring for my mom, so like I said, I FaceTimed her every every night. My brother took on the primary caregiver role. She took her to her appointments and the hate her hair appointments, grocery shopping, all of that kind of stuff. I did her bills electronically, and so I was so glad I did a lot of the efficiencies months, months, and months before. And so I could do 99% of her bills were done electronically. And then when something came in, she would just fake we would talk on FaceTime and we would I would pay it online when we were together. So uh when her prescriptions were renewed, I got a notice online saying that her prescriptions could be picked up. So my brother would I would contact my brother and said, Hey, you got another prescription to pick up with mom. And I had access to my mom's patient portal, and I could send messages to the doctor, read the doctor notes, and the only she only had really one major appointment when I was away, and I was part of their Zoom meeting, and so that the doctor had the Zoom call up with my brother there and my mom there and her there, and they went ahead and did the recap of the the appointment with me. So I was so glad that we have technology, the efficiencies, and the simplicities were in place for mom during that time. Um, I know she missed our Sunday fun days together and our time together, but we made the best of it. And I'm so grateful for her. Another piece is working my job. And you as a caregiver have to figure out how you're gonna work your job. If I couldn't work from, I was grateful I worked from at home. So it was really just shifting my computer and stuff and bringing it with me, and I had to confirm that the Wi-Fi was strong enough. But I also took some time that first week. I took caregiver leave, um, disability, that kind of thing that first week, and that required some paperwork. But then after that, I had conversations with my boss and my team. I had them prior to that as well. And what was nice about it, I had flexible, adjustable hours during that time. They allowed me to do that. Not every job has that, and I'm grateful that I did have that. I shuffled some of my heavier assignments to other team members during that time, which was wonderful to do. And it was really hard, though, from a guilt perspective, to lean on others. But now that I look back on it, I would do the same for anybody else that was going through that. What I learned that I needed to pack, that I did pack, and I'm so glad I did. I packed my laptop. I packed my big monitor because if I am going to be away for that length of time and have to work, I couldn't work off a little laptop screen. I'm so used to working off of a big monitor. And so it felt so strange to bring in a big monitor into Kathy's house when we were pushing in our stuff, but I am so grateful I did. One of the things that I wish I would have done that I didn't do was bring in an office chair. I was in one of these just regular chair, wooden chairs. It had a cushion on it, but I was so sore from being in that chair. I even went and bought this mini beanbag meditation pillow to sit on. That didn't help. I couldn't adjust the height, I couldn't get comfortable, and it was it was hard. Um, hint hint in future episodes. I will talk about I actually bought another office chair while I was there and had it delivered from Amazon because I couldn't, after like three days, I couldn't even move my neck. It was so uncomfortable. So I did do that. We laugh about it to this day that yeah, she had to go ahead and buy office furniture while we were away. Um to kind of kind of close out here a couple things that I didn't think about at all. That if I had you and we were having a conversation over coffee, I would tell you in this preparation time, I want you to think about what you're going to do from your own self-care. You think about your loved one the whole time, eight weeks being away, and this is what's gonna happen, and this is what's gonna do. Sure, I packed my tennis shoes and a warm jacket and a hat to walk outside. I even brought my journal, but I but I wish I would have thought more about my self-care strategy and really talking about that, and that's gonna be a whole episode that I want to talk about because being in this stressful situation, being away from home, being in a very different schedule, and being, I'm gonna be really blunt honest, locked in a room with your loved one for 24-7. It's hard to go ahead and release your stress and anxiety and burnout and emotions. And so that's something that even if I would have read it, I'm not sure if I would have taken it seriously. And so I want to do a whole podcast episode on that, and I cannot wait. So be stay tuned for that. Another thing that I didn't think a lot about, but as we were driving there, Dennis had to be isolated. He could not simple things like if worst case scenario, he had to go to the bathroom, would he risk going into a gas station bathroom? That is a huge risk on the way down to go ahead and have your transplant. And uh we couldn't order and go through a drive-through, or if we did, I could eat, but he couldn't eat a lot of the things. Like he couldn't eat meat because what's the risk of them not cooking it all the way? Um, and so just things like that. We did make, and I shouldn't say make the mistake because I I wouldn't, I don't regret it, but we did have family over for the holidays before, and everybody was healthy, but we did catch influenza. I don't remember if it was A or B, but we were darn sick, and he got sick. And so the big thing for us during this preparation time and getting ready for. The the couple weeks before it had to be no visitors, uh limiting stops and not going to restaurants. And he was really in a bubble. He was in a bubble, and we had to go ahead and keep him healthy and away from viruses. And so being more, I'm trying to think of the word, being more cognizant of that and watching that more would be something was one of my lessons learned. So kind of to end today here, once you have a couple weeks usually to pull this all together. As I thought of things while we were doing this, I would write it on the list. Some of the things that you don't really think about until it happens is, oh my gosh, I'm not going to be back for two months. Do I need my hair done? Or my nails done? Sure, those are like minor things, but for you, a haircut might be something where, or a hair color might be something where you want to get it done right before. Or I had to change like my dental appointments, or do you have a prescription that needs to be refilled? And you only have like three pills left or a week's worth left. And what are you going to do when you need your prescriptions? And so being able to see if the pharmacist will go ahead and ship those to you, or you can get an extra month's supply, or if there's a place that you can pick them up instead of at your local city. I also have the list of follow-ups to resolve before we we started. And so I had to take paperwork with me and the binder with me because even when we got there, we were still doing that. So as I conclude today's episode, I want to first of all commend Freighter Hospital, Jeannie, the transplant coordinator, and the entire transplant team for providing resources to Dennis to prepare for his transplant. The the app on the phone with all the schedules on it, uh, the the binder that had the maps and all of the things on there. It was a great resource to get us started. But as a caregiver, there were much more things that weren't in the information, and I had to plan and prepare for myself. And those were the unknowns. That's why I'm sharing this series of episodes about this transplant process. Dennis's bone marrow transplant or aka the stem cells that were transplanted, so that you, the caregiver, can find helpful tips and hints and hacks, whatever you want to say to make this process better. Even if your loved one isn't in this bone marrow transplant process or isn't a patient for this, I know there are times that you could pull information or things that you could use because you're always preparing for a surgery or something for your loved one, preparing for physical therapy that's going to spark thoughts and tips for you. And then lastly, as I conclude today, as I said at the beginning, if you know somebody that's going through this process or will be going through this process, please share episode 151, which was last week's, this week's episode, which is 152, and the whole it's now a go kind of thing. The transplant is now scheduled. So now what episode this is, and then the future ones that I'm going to have. Because next week I want to talk about now you're in your first week or weeks, you're getting settled in. And I want to go through and talk about what that looks like and what I did to keep my sanity and to keep my stress levels down, to be prepared, what to bring to appointments, you know, how you know the transportation process. I want to get into all of that so that you can have a better view and a picture from your end. So I better quit today here. Um, so you have a good rest of your Tuesday. And as always, in every episode that I talk about, it's so important for you to keep your cup full because the stress and the overwhelm and the fatigue and all of the changes that happen to you as a caregiver are exhausting. And we like to go ahead and take our cup and give it to others and fill their cups. But don't forget, each and every day, you have to keep your cup full and or at least keep filling it so that you have something in your cup and you don't run run dry. So enjoy the rest of the day. Thank you for listening. And as always, we'll see you next Tuesday. Bye for now.